Ahsoka Tano and Captain Rex Are Dead
"We are tragedians, you see?
We follow directions.
There is no choice involved.
The bad end unhappily, the good, unluckily.
That is what tragedy means."
- The Player, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead
Chapter 24. What Tragedy Means
There were many times, since his death, that Rex wished he had his blasters.
This was one such time. Since he could not shoot the oncoming spider droids himself, he instead turned, plunged one luminous blue-gold arm into the fiery red-orange colors of another trooper, and roared, "Incoming! Poppers! From behind!" into his ear.
They'd learned, in the time since the battle began, that it was best if Rex did the yelling. The voice of a woman was unexpected on this particular battlefield, occupied as it was by male clone troopers and led by a male Jedi General. Rex's voice matched almost every other, and it was heavily ingrained with the accent of authority and tenor of command. Hearing such a voice shouting orders created instant obedience, rather than a puzzled pause of bewilderment, while the trooper in question tried to figure out who was telling him to do what.
Ahsoka found it frustrating, and though Rex sympathized, there was little time for lamenting it. His voice was more effective, and that efficacy saved lives.
The trooper encased in the red-orange aura spun, unclipping two droid poppers from his belt and throwing them in a single, fluid motion. They hit the ground with a metallic clatter and rolled, just as the spindly legs of the spider droids pulled their armed domes up over the rim of the platform. Their crimson ocular arrays targeted the team of clones swarming the ATX energy pillar and fixing detonators to its' base, rather than to the pair of unassuming metal canisters rolling under their bodies. Before the droids' blaster cannons could lock onto a target, those canisters erupted into a crackling electricity field, and the pair of droids reared back, flailing their forward legs as they shuddered and their targeting arrays went dark. They crashed down, then slid back off the platform.
Another spider droid, accompanied by a trio of SBD's rose to take their place, but this time there were more men turned the right way, at the right time, and one of them was wielding a chaingun. Blue blasterfire churned out the end, catching the approaching droids dead-on and mowing them down.
"Done! Move out!" the leader of the team of troopers shouted, and the group of six men bolted forward, the chaingun wielder in the lead, clearing a path through the oncoming wave of droids. Rex hesitated, looking back over his shoulder. There were more droids converging on their position, a pair of droidekas in the lead, but even if they were able to take out the team of troopers, the damage was all but done; droidekas wouldn't be capable of removing the charges with their blasters-for-fingers, and the B1's backing them up were too far behind. The team was working its way beyond the blast radius. A few more seconds and they'd be clear for detonation. Red laser bolts winged through the air; most flew wide, though one struck the lattermost of the clone team, and he spun within a swirl of green and silver spirit-light, the luminosity of his aura lifting skyward as his body crumpled to the ground.
One of his teammates screamed something incomprehensible, half turned back as he ran and standing witness to his brother's death. He turned fully and opened fire, shooting wildly into the mass of droids giving chase.
Beside him, Ahsoka cursed, and Rex found himself flickering forward, crossing the meters between the energy pillar's platform and the screaming trooper in an instant. Ahsoka pulled him forward, then pushed him at the man, and Rex obliged, stretching out his voice, pitching it through his aura and projecting it into the air. "You're no good to him dead, too! Run!"
For a moment, Rex thought he'd have to yell again, but then the trooper wavered and began to pull back. Abruptly, he turned, then bolted forward, rushing to catch up to the remainder of his team, now several dozen meters ahead and taking cover behind a pile of cargo crates. The closer he got, the better their cover fire protected him, and he slid into their defensive line, took up an empty space, and again opened fire.
One word rang out from the team leader. "Clear!"
Then the energy pillar exploded.
The droids rushing towards the pillar were caught up in the blast, a white-hot inferno of exploding electricity and ordinance. The boom rattled the walls, the ceiling, and the floor, jolting not a few droids from their feet as the overpressure radiated outward. A second explosion sounded, deeper within the pillar's platform, this time shooting a jet of red flame and oily black smoke straight up into the air. Metal shrapnel whistled out, pieces half molten, jagged. They lodged themselves in the ceiling, walls, floor, and bodies of droids.
The shockwave of energy and heat swept through Rex with a warm shudder, and he looked back at the team of five yellow-striped troopers. Their leader, a man with a lieutenant's stripes on his armor, wasn't giving them any time to rest; he tossed the detonator in his hand aside, then began urging the rest of the team to move. The side of the crates facing the explosion was flecked with burning bits of debris. The five men fell into formation, weapons out as they ran across the lower level and towards another platoon of clone troopers, an exit, and relative safety.
The droids still standing were in disarray, either firing after the retreating clone troopers, or trying to regroup around command droids. The roar of the inferno rumbled through the air, the heat rippling as it expanded beyond the column of silky orange flames. It lit the vast cavern luridly, the dark corners and vaulted ceiling of the lower hangar awash in firelight.
Ahsoka stiffened. He could feel her sudden tension, a fresh wave of alertness. Her eyes closed halfway, her head tilted, and the dark tips of her montrals twitched as her aura expanded, electric blue flickering over vibrant green, soft edges reaching out, seeking something.
She straightened abruptly, with a small gasp and a broad smile. "Can you hear it?" she asked him, but he could only shake his head. There was only the sound of the inferno melting through the remains of the energy pillar's consoles, and the blasterfire exchanged by clones and surviving droids.
He had only a moment's warning, and that came from his familiarity with Ahsoka and the slight changes in her expressions. Her smile took on an additional edge of delight, as though she was about to tell him some good news, or show him something exciting – and a moment later, she did.
The dull roar of the immolating energy pillar disappeared as Ahsoka moved them from one space to another, and the sound was replaced by the powerful, undulating warble of a victorious varactyl. They reappeared remarkably close to the green and blue scales of the creature, and were forced to take a step back as the reptavian flexed her muscles, rearing and tossing the feathery crest on her head.
Sitting on the dragonmount's back, wreathed in all the radiant colors of the sea, was a battered, but very much alive, General Kenobi.
Ahsoka's next words seemed to give some finality to what must have happened. "He did it," she said softly, sounding at first awed and stunned, but as she said it again, her voice melted into the strength of pride and relief, and a ferocious grin spread across her face. "He did it!"
Rex's first impulse was to celebrate; it was only a matter of time, now, before the battle ended. With Dooku and Grievous both dead, the Separatist army's back was broken and the war virtually over. They had no command structure. They won. The Republic won.
He laughed once, feeling his shoulders shake at the motion, even though his gut wrenched at the thought of the last three and a half years. So many dead, and so many worries left, about the future, about General Skywalker, about the Chancellor, about friends scattered throughout the galaxy. There would still be fighting with the remnant of the Separatist fleet. They needed to end the battle still raging around them. There was still death and suffering in the future. But this - this was what he was born for. This was what all of his brothers were born for, this very moment.
The relief that Ahsoka expressed in words seemed to fill him so completely, he bent forward, closing his eyes. A thin arm slipped around his shoulders and hugged him, gentle and close. A face was pressed into the crook of his neck, and a small nose poked into the soft chink between the bottom rim of his helmet and the ridge of his pauldron, seeking out the part of his neck that was uncovered by armor. He hugged her back, and felt her laugh once, sharply, and he couldn't decide whether it sounded happy from the impending victory or sad from the thought of all that had been sacrificed.
General Kenobi's voice lifted above the furor of nearby battle, rich and steady. "Thank you, Cody. Now let's get a move on. We have a battle to win, here."
Kenobi was right, of course. If he were alive, he wouldn't be indulging himself in a moment of sentimentality like this – Cody wasn't. Cody still had a battle to fight, to finish. But as word spread, and the realization grew, Rex knew that sentimentality of hope, of anticipation, of victory, would buoy every man and propel him forward.
They won.
Rex smiled, and let himself be glad.
General Kenobi's lightsaber ignited in his hand, bright and blue and humming, and he charged forward again. Rex lifted his head from where it leaned against Ahsoka's, and tracked the course Kenobi was on; there was a command station across the sinkhole, still holding out despite the foothold Cody had established around the sinkhole's perimeter. With that station also eliminated, there would be no one left in charge, and what coordination was left would dissolve into chaos. The recent destruction of the energy pillar left the Seps without any way of maintaining a supply of energy to the battle droids. They were running on whatever energy was left in their power cells until they were either destroyed or forced to shut down. It wouldn't be long, now.
A pitched beeping interrupted his thoughts, and he turned his attention back to Cody, who was drawing out his imagecaster in response to the hail. A hooded and robed figure shimmered to life out of the projection unit, little more than a handspan tall. Ahsoka shifted in his arms, lifting her head as she turned to look back over the unfolding scene. "Who?" she began, puzzled, but grew silent as she twisted further, trying to get a better look. Rex frowned slightly, unable to recognize the figure from behind. It wasn't a clone, and it wasn't General Kenobi.
The voice, though, when he heard it, sent a chill of recognition through him. Low and thin but possessing the utter power of unquestioned authority, the Chancellor said, "Commander Cody. The time has come. Execute Order 66."
The amber colored light that encircled Cody so brightly died to the barest flicker.
In his response, Cody did not hesitate. There was no sadness in his words, no uncertainty, no shock or disbelief. There was only the quiet resolution of a commander given orders he could not refute.
"Yes, my lord."
The holoprojector in his hand swtiched off, and the translucent blue figure of the Chancellor disappeared.
Ahsoka's voice was confused. "Rex, what's Order 66? I don't know that one."
If Rex had been about to move forward, to follow an order he did not want to, to draw a weapon he did not have, that motion was halted by the innocent question of the young woman still half in his arms. If he stopped, Ahsoka did not. She began to move forward, stretching an arm out towards Cody even as she walked, slipping further out of his embrace. "His light's going out," she said, with a slow tinge of fear beginning to creep into her voice. "Rex, that was the Chancellor." She stopped for a moment to turn back and look at him with startled eyes, seemingly unable to settle on anger, protectiveness, or horror. She took a half step back towards him, placed a hand on the side of his helmet as though it was his cheek, and looked him up and down. He lowered his gaze, realizing some of the luminosity that enveloped him was fading as well. Just as it had the last time he heard the Chancellor give an order, just as the last time he felt impossibly compelled to obey. Ahsoka's voice was as frightened as it was commanding when he heard it again. Her hand tightened on his helmet, and she shook him once, asking for answers, looking into the black strip of his visor as though she could see straight through to his eyes. "What did he tell you to do? Rex, what is Order 66?"
He was dead. He didn't have to follow the Chancellor's orders anymore. The Chancellor who had an aura as malignant as Dooku, a traitor to the Jedi, to the Republic.
To each his own. He could choose who he wanted to protect. His own family, his own friends. Ahsoka's face was so close, so frightened, but struggling to keep control of that fear. Her eyes were so blue and so wide, so determined. She wasn't supposed to be frightened. So few things in the galaxy could scare her. She was fearless to a point where she was reckless with her own safety, but she was afraid for him. He looked at Cody, the illumination around him dull and low, more brown than gleaming bronze. She was afraid for Cody, too. Afraid for what the Chancellor had just commanded of them, and she should be.
Cody was turning, lifting a hand towards a nearby AT-TE walker. It was in a defensive position, poised to take out any enemy fire coming from above, from the sky beyond the sinkhole.
It was also well placed to take aim at a single man wreathed in serene blue and cool green, mounted on the back of a swift footed varactyl, climbing the rocky wall of the sinkhole towards the place that would truly end this battle for them all.
There was no thought involved, when Rex leapt them from their spot near Cody to that AT-TE a dozen meters away on the platform. His only plan was to interrupt, to stop the cannon, to make it misfire, to stop the death of at least the one Jedi that was in front of them, even as, across the galaxy, others would be cut down, one by one.
They arrived half inside the cramped, roof-mounted cockpit of the walker, torsos emerging straight out of the command console in front of the mass-driver cannon's gunner. Rex reached out with one hand, expanded and deepened the luminosity around him until it reached the narrow band of visible light that humans could see, and let his voice carry through the cockpit with the ring of as much authority and command as he could muster. "No!"
Rex didn't know the man – he was 212th – but at the sight of the specter of a dead clone Captain boiling up out of his command console and clawing its' way towards him with a thunderous howl, his green-red spirit-light reeled, and he jerked backward on the controls just as the cannon fired.
There was a moment of silence, as the echo of the cannon's fire faded, and the gunner with yellow stripes on his armor and an aura of swirling garnet and jade sat and stared at the apparition before him. His hands were extended, bracing him against the armored walls of the gun turret, and he'd flung himself as far back in his seat as he could, spine arching to get away from the wraith that, a moment ago, seemed to be clamoring for him.
He could not remember a time when one of his brothers was afraid of him. Afraid of failing him, maybe, or not reaching the goals he laid out for them in a battle, but not afraid of him as a person. The trooper's chest was rising and falling, his breathing heavy with alarm. There were no words to say, to calm him, to reassure him. No wise platitudes to inform him of the great mistake that was even now being enacted on the galaxy. He lowered his head, and felt Ahsoka's free hand come up to his shoulder and begin to pull him back, away.
"It's not right," Rex told the man as he faded and withdrew. "It's not right."
Rex couldn't see the man's eyes widen behind the black slash of his visor, but he did see the glitter of his aura sharpen, brighten, while his body relaxed back into the seat, as though some fear had slipped away.
A moment later, Ahsoka was pulling him up through the walker's roof to stand on top of it, looking out over the sinkhole. There was a black pockmark of char smeared across the far wall of the cavern, not quite to the command station.
There was a question in her eyes, and he wasn't sure how to answer it yet. Not the greater question, at least. "Do you think he made it?" she asked quietly.
It was such a long way, to the bottom of an Utapau sinkhole.
Was it just a moment ago, everything looked like it was going to be alright? The melee behind them was still ongoing, the deep booms of ordinance underpinning the sharper, staccato tattoo of blasterfire. More troopers were being deposited by more gunships, and the rush of men seemed endless. The small Republic command area there at the lip of the hangar bay, though heavily defended, was still taking the occasional stray blaster shot. There was a strangeness to the fight now, though. The men moved, fought, but there was a tightness to the radiance around them, an uncertainty that was not there a few minutes ago. Cody stood amid them all, giving orders, moving them forward, commanding and taking the lead effortlessly, as all his years of training and experience taught him to do. But to Rex's eyes, his movements were mechanical, false and forced.
Rex's hand tightened around Ahsoka's smaller one, and he said, tensely, "Let's find out."
They moved forward together, disappearing from the top of the AT-TE and then reappearing at the bottom of the sinkhole, floating just above the surface of one of the many deep pools at the sinkhole's base. Their toes dangled a bare inch above the blue water. Rex turned to the right, while Ahsoka turned to the left, scanning for any sign of life. If Kenobi had landed on one of the rocky protrusions between the pools, there was no chance of survival. He'd have broken in half. If he'd managed to splash down in one of the lakelets, and not snap his neck, there was a chance he was alive. General Kenobi had almost as many lives as General Skywalker; if there was anyone capable of surviving that drop, he would be the one.
Ahsoka's voice was almost breathless when she gasped, "There!" and he found himself skip several dozen meters across the sinkhole's floor to hover over a slowly moving blur of aquamarine light, swimming just beneath the surface. Fabric billowed around the form, and it was slowly gliding towards the surface, eventually emerging in the shadows of a steep canyon wall. General Kenobi surfaced from the water and clung to the rough stone cliff, tucking his rebreather back into his belt and hanging just long enough to take a gulp of air, before he began hauling himself upward.
He let Ahsoka lead him, set them drifting forward and slowly upward in sync with the progress General Kenobi made. He climbed slowly, grunting as he stretched for each handhold, tested each foothold. The seaside colors around him were strange, sometimes expanding widely, other times growing small and tight around him, and he'd pause in his movements to bend his head, breathe heavily, and wince.
Some fifty meters up the rock face was the entrance to the lowest level of Pau City. It would not be a safe area, dark and likely occupied with cave-dwelling creatures that would be happy to fill their bellies with a weary Jedi. But it would also be unoccupied by either Separatist battle droids or by clone troopers, whose loyalty no longer lay with the Jedi. General Kenobi placed a hand on the ridge of the entrance's deck, and slowly pulled himself up over the edge, Rex and Ahsoka floating slowly along behind him.
For a moment, General Kenobi lay sprawled on the deck, simply breathing, his chest rising and falling rapidly. The moment, though, was a short one, and he rolled onto his side and began pushing himself upright, moving with the urgency of a man who knew the danger was not over, and his life was still on the line. Rex looked away from his gently lambent figure, working its way towards the dark cavern of Pau City's lowest level. Cody would know better than to assume the fall killed him. He'd either send a squad with scanners or a set of probe droids, most likely probes since there would be few men to spare mid-battle. He would perform these orders with as much exaction as he did any other. To appear otherwise would put his own life at risk, and those of others around him as well; you did not aid or abet those who were declared traitors.
"I don't understand this." Ahsoka's voice was tense, pained, and she was looking after the slowly fading spot of aquamarine light that was General Kenobi, as his spirit-light was slowly overwhelmed by the darkness. "Why, Rex? Why would he do this? Cody! Why?"
Her confusion and shock was slowly working its way into a sense of righteous anger, and the whirling aurora of colors around her was spinning more and more rapidly. Her slender hand was tight around his fingers, not quite to crushing, but indicative of her growing distress. Cody was a friend, like any other, a comrade in arms and a trusted ally. For her, it was enough. For her, it was so easy, to question authority, to challenge it. General Skywalker probably had some hand in that, but it wasn't the General's influence alone. Ahsoka was a Jedi, a Togruta. She was made from red clay, stardust and the Force. She was not a copy, not the result of spliced genes duplicated millions of times over. She was the product of craftsmanship, of the nurturing of a group of people dedicated to the betterment of all people. He was the product of an assembly line, not of nurture and care but of training, of drills, of a duty enforced on him. She was meant to defend the people of the Republic; he was meant to defend the institution itself, and whether it was led by a corrupt man or an honest one mattered not at all. It was this difference between them she had never fully understood, and though he was grateful that she saw him as no different from any other man, possibly even loved her for it, they were as different as the Dark and the Light.
When he spoke, his words were bitter, angry; not at her, she couldn't help what she was any more than he could, but it hurt. It hurt to understand why Cody did what he just did.
"Because he was given an order. We're clones. We follow orders. There is no choice involved. We do what we're told because that's all we've ever done. Loyalty, dedication, faith, sacrifice, that's what matters."
Would he have done the same? Turned against Ahsoka? Against General Skywalker? Ahsoka was beyond the reach of this order now, far beyond it, but was someone turning on the General? Killing him too? Was Appo even now opening fire and gunning him down, as the order spread across the galaxy, from one communication relay to another, then on to the imagecasters and holoprojectors of every clone commander, every trooper in the GAR? Appo would open fire. They all would, even the good ones. Good ones like Cody. Good ones like Bly, Gree, Wolffe, Fox. Or would their Jedi recognize in time what was happening, and fight back? How many Jedi were striking down his brothers in their own defense?
How many would think to question? How many would think something was wrong, wonder why those they trusted implicitly a moment before were now turncoats to be slaughtered?
"Independence is for being able to lead when there are no other leaders. Creativity is only for battle, for creating better ways of killing. Courage is for running to the front of the fight, to look death in the face and to lead a charge into battle, not lead a charge of insubordination." His voice began to rise, sharp and angry as he looked out over the black maw of the cavern before them. "There is no challenging authority, there is no questioning, there is no why! The Chancellor is the highest authority, and he said so, and that's enough! "
Ahsoka was staring at him, with her impossibly blue eyes wide, stricken. It hurt. It hurt knowing his first impulse was also to obey, to strike against his designated target, to be unquestioning and thorough in his compliance, just as Cody was right now. It wasn't fair. It wasn't right.
A hand was placed on his shoulder, gently, but Ahsoka did not look at him. "You tried to follow his orders on the Invisible Hand. That's why you were so…." She flinched suddenly, her eyes squeezing shut.
"There is no choice involved." Rex lowered his head, closing his eyes momentarily before forcing them open again. "We've all been used, and this, this! This is what we were used for. I always knew there was an evil out there, even though I didn't know what it was. I don't know what's worse. The holocaust that was just declared against the Jedi, or the fact my brothers are carrying it out."
Ahsoka winced again, lifting a hand and placing her palm between her white brows. He grimaced at her pained motion, and felt the hurt in his chest deepen at her next, incredulous words. "Against the Jedi? Not just General Kenobi, but all of them?"
She didn't know the fullness of the meaning behind Order 66. The order was a contingency, unlikely to ever be enacted. There was no reason for him to immediately think of it, after realizing the Chancellor's intentions for the Republic were in doubt, but he felt a stab of helpless stupidity all the same. If the Chancellor was working alongside the Sith, then the destruction of the Jedi would have to be a goal. They all stood in his way; Kenobi would not be alone.
Ahsoka staggered then, groaning, and he slid an arm under hers, supporting her as she suddenly reeled, the luxurious cobalt and emerald colors of her aura suddenly paling, much as her face did. When she repeated the words, "All of them," it was not a question, and her hand slid from where it clutched her head to cover her mouth. When her hand slipped away from her lips to fall to her side, she said one single word with a terrified certainty.
"Home."
And they were gone.
Thoughts?
~Queen